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Sweet Sorrow
For All Nails #163: Sweet Sorrow by Jonathan Edelstein ---- :Nieuw Rotterdam, FN1 Cape Kingdom :30 November 1974 The envelope from the Dutch consulate was the first one that Marinus Zaaijer saw. FN2 "Come here, Sannie," he called, handing the package to her as she entered. "Open it. I'm afraid." His wife opened the envelope expertly and removed a letter on the stationary of the Dutch government. "Mynheer Zaaijer..." "You don't need to read that part, Sannie." She ignored him. "I am pleased to inform you that upon review of your submissions, the Kingdom of the Netherlands is satisfied that you are a Dutch citizen, and a passport in your name is enclosed herewith. I am further pleased to inform you that the applications of Susanna Zaaijer, Pieter Zaaijer, Adriaan Zaaijer and Sofie Zaaijer for immigrant status has been approved, and that they may enter the Kingdom of the Netherlands at any time within one year of the date of this notice..." Marinus lifted Sannie from the floor and swung her around. "We're going home, Sannie!" he shouted. "We're going home!" "Home?" Sannie said. "You've never even seen the place, Rijn." "Home, Sannie." Marinus had been born and raised in the Cape, but he had been sure all his life that Holland was home. At one time, his father would have slapped him silly if he said anything else. Old Bastiaan had only been a minor government clerk before the war, but he believed that if he had been given a chance, he could have stopped the German armies. To the end of his life, he'd cursed the "traitors" in the Dutch government, describing the royal family in terms he would have hesitated to use against mad dogs. He had gone to the meetings and rallies and often come back in tears; Holland was the home to which he could never return, but he had no other. For Marinus, things had been a little different. He grew up in the working-class quarter of Nieuw Rotterdam, angered his father by speaking in the Cape dialect, married a native Cape girl and raised a family. He had absorbed his father's lessons -- it would have been impossible not to -- and his first loyalty was still to a country thousands of miles to the north, but it was not the burning passion it had been for Bastiaan. Yet it was he, and not his father, who was returning. The reason for that lay no further than the other envelope that had arrived that day - the one that contained his paycheck. A week as a foreman on the Nieuw Rotterdam docks earned him less than six thousand crowns - barely enough to pay the rent and keep his loke running FN3. It wasn't bad pay in the Cape, but he wanted his children to have more, and six thousand crowns a week wasn't enough to provide it to them. Once, the Cape was where people went when they wanted something more. When Rijn's father had emigrated from the Netherlands, he had found not only freedom but riches; at the time, the Cape had a higher standard of living than Holland, and the ravages of the war had only increased the disparity. Since the war, though, the Dutch economy had taken off while the Cape's had not. Ironically, conquest had been good for the Netherlands; as a member of the Zollverein, it had duty-free access to a market of several hundred million. As it rebuilt after the war, it found ready sources of income in the consumers of Germany, Poland and France. And the Cape? The Cape didn't have to rebuild, but its domestic market consisted of barely more than five million people, and it wasn't connected to a trading network like the Zollverein or the United Empire. Its neighbors weren't rich, and they protected what little industry they had. In only thirty years, the Cape's standard of living had fallen to half that of the Netherlands, and if nothing were done to reverse the trend, it might soon be a third or a quarter. Those who had Dutch citizenship -- even those who had once sworn they would never return -- were increasingly thinking about going home, and many were doing more than that. Marinus was far from sure that he was doing the right thing. Even aside from his father's ghost howling from beyond, he wondered if his family was Dutch enough for the Netherlands. How would Amsterdam treat a man who arrived home with a Coloured wife? Would Sannie's reserved Dutch Reformed propriety be offended by Mexican music and dance halls? Would Sannie and the children be mocked when they spoke Cape Dutch? Would he? But there were other questions that had more important answers. Would Pieter and Adriaan be able to go to college if the family stayed in the Cape? Would his children grow up to lead lives like his, or even to envy him? Would they be limited to the opportunities available in a country far away from anywhere? "We're going home, Sannie." ---- Forward to FAN #164: Under Heartbeat City's Golden Sun. Forward to 30 November 1974: Hey Mister, That's Me Up On the Jukebox. Forward to Queen Alexandra: Fantascience Friction. Return to For All Nails. Category:Alexandra